Gospel of John

The Gospel of John is the fourth of the canonical gospels of the New Testament of the Christian Bible. Written by John the Apostle, it covers the years 26 to 33 AD, concerning the split of the Jesus movement from mainstream Judaism in the church-synagogue debate.

Chapter 1
John the Apostle began his Gospel by writing about the circumstances surrounding God's becoming flesh as Jesus: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came for testimony, to bear witness to the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness through the light. The true light that enlightens every man was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made throgh him, yet the world knew him not. He came to his own home, and his own people received him not. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God; who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God." The word became flesh and dwelt among the Jews, full of grace and truth; John the Baptist bore witness to the man, saying, "He who comes after me ranks before me, for he was before me." John the Apostle then wrote that, while Moses gave the law, Jesus brought grace and truth.

When asked by the priests and Levites from Jerusalem, John the Baptist denied being Elijah, the Christ, or the prophet, saying, "I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, 'Make straight the way of the Lord,' as the prophet Isaiah said." The Pharisees then came to Bethany and asked John why he was baptizing, if he was neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet, and he said, "I baptize with water; but among you stands one whom you do not know, even he who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie."

The next day, John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, 'After me comes a man who ranks before me, for he was before me.' I myself did not know him; but for this I came baptizing with water, that he might be revealed to Israel." John then bore witness that he saw the Spirit descend as a dove from heaven, and it remained on him. God then told John that he on whom he saw the Spirit descend and remain was the man who baptized with the Holy Spirit, and he saw and bore witness that Jesus was the son of God.

The next day again, John was standing with two of his disciples and looked at Jesus as he walked, saying, "Behold, the Lamb of God!" The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. Jesus asked the disciples what they sought, and they asked where he saw staying. Jesus showed them where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day. One of the two who heard John speak and followed him was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, and he said to Peter, "We have found the Messiah." He brought Peter to Jesus, who decided to call him "Cephas" (meaning "Peter").

The next day, Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, "Follow me." Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter, and he found Nathanael and said to him, "We have found him of whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." Nathanael said to him, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" Philip told him to come and see, and Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, saying, "Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!" Nathanael said to him, "How do you know me?" Jesus answered, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you." Nathanael answered him, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!" Jesus responded that Nathanael would see greater things than his statement, and he told him that he would see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.

Chapter 2
On the third day there was a marriage at Cana in  Galilee, and Mary, the mother of Jesus, was there. Jesus was also invited to the marriage with his disciples. When the wine ran out, Mary told him that they had no wine. Jesus then said to her, "O woman, what have you to do with me? My hour has not yet come." His mother then said to the servants to do whatever Jesus told them, and Jesus had them fill six stone jars with 20-30 gallons of water. He then turned the water into wine, performing the first of his signs and manifesting his glory. After this he went down to Capernaum with his mother, brethren, and disciples, and he stayed there for a few days.

The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found those who were selling oxen, sheep, and pigeons, and the money-changers at their business. Making a whip of cords, he drove them all, with the sheep and oxen, out of the temple, pouring out the coins of the money-changers and overturning their tables. He then told the pigeon-sellers, "Take these things away; you shall not make my Father's house a house of trade." His disciples remembered that it was written, "Zeal for thy house will consume me." The Jews then asked Jesus what sign they had to show them for doing it, and Jesus told them to destroy the temple, as he would raise it up in three days. The Jews then said that it had taken 46 years to build the temple, and expressed doubt that Jesus could raise it up in three days. However, he was speaking of the temple of his body, as he would be raised three days after his crucifixion. Jesus performed many signs at the Passover feast in Jerusalem, but he did not trust himself to them, because he knew all men and needed no one to bear witness to man, knowing what was in man.

Chapter 3
The Pharisee Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, came to Jesus and night and told him that the Jews knew that he was a teacher who came from God. Jesus then told him that, unless one was born anew, he could not see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus asked him how a man could be born again when he was old, and if he could enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born. Jesus answered that, unless one was born of water and the Spirit, he could not enter the kingdom of God, and that which was born of flesh would be flesh, while that which was born of the Spirit was spirit. He then ridiculed Nicodemus for being a teacher of Israel and not knowing about the spirit, and he said that, if he had told him earthly things and he would not believe, he could not believe him if he told him heavenly things. He also said that whoever believed in the Son of Man could have eternal life.

After this, Jesus and his disciples went into Judea, where he remained with them and baptized. John was also baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because there was much water there, and people came and were baptized. A discussion arose between John's disciples and a Jew over purifying, and they came to John and said to him, "Rabbi, he who was with you beyond the Jordan, to whom you bore witness, here he is, baptizing, and all are going to him." John answered, "No one can receive anything except what is given him from heaven. You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him. He who has the bride is the bridegroom; the friend of the bridegroom, who wtands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice; therefore this joy of mine is now full. He must increase, but I must decrease."

Chapter 4
When God knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John (although Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples), he left Judea and departed again to Galilee. He had to pass through Samaria, passing through the city of Sychar near the field that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and so Jesus, wearied as he was with his journey, sat down beside the well at about the sixth hour.

There came a Samaritan woman, Photini, to draw water. Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink," as his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. The Samaritan woman said to him, "How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?" The Jews had no dealings with Samaritans, causing hostility on the part of the woman. Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him and he would have given you living water." She told him that he had nothing to draw with, and that the well was deep; she then asked him if he was greater than Jacob, who gave the Samaritans the well. Jesus responded, "Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst; the water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." The woman asked for Jesus to give her that water, so that she may not thirst, nor come to the well to draw. Jesus told her to call her husband and come back, but she answered that she had no husband. Jesus than said, "You are right in saying, 'I have no husband'; for you have had five husbands, and he whom you now have is not your husband; this you said truly." The woman, amazed, perceived that Jesus was a prophet. Jesus told her that the hour was coming when neither on the mountain at Sychar nor in Jerusalem would she worship the Father, saying that she worshipped what she did not know. He told her that the time was coming when the true worshippers would worship the Father in spirit and truth, for such the Father sought to worship him. The woman said to him, "I know that Messiah is coming; when he comes, he will show us all things." Jesus said to her, "I who speek to you am he."

Just then, Jesus' disciples came, and they marvelled that he was talking with a woman. The woman left her water jar and went away into the city, telling the people, "Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?" They went out of the city and came to him. At the same time, his disciples asked Jesus to eat, but he told them, "I have food to eat of which you do not know." The disciples said to one another, "Has any one brought him food?" Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work." He then said that he wanted his disciples to reap that for which they did not labor, as others had labored, and they had entered into their labor.

Many Samaritans from that city believed him him because of the woman's testimony, and they asked Jesus to stay with them. He stayed in Sychar for two days, and many more believed because of his word. They then told the woman, "It is no longer because of your words that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world." After the two days, he departed to Galilee, for Jesus himself testified that a prophed had no honor in his own country. When he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast, for they too had goen to the feast.

Jesus came again to Cana in Galilee, and then to Capernaum. There, an official whose son was ill came to Jesus, begging him to come down and heal his son, as he was at the point of death. Jesus therefore said to him, "Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe." The official said to him, "Sir, come down before my child dies." Jesus said to him, "Go; your son will live." The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went home; as he was going down, his servants met him and told him that his son was living. He asked them the hour when he began to mend, and they said to him, "Yesterday at the seventh your the fever left him." The father knew that this was the hour when Jesus had said to him that his son would live, and he and his household believed in Jesus, the second sign that Jesus did when he had come from Judea to Galilee.

Chapter 5
After this, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. At the pool Bethzatha, near the Sheep Gate, a multitude of invalids laid down. One man was blind, lame, and paralyzed, annd Jesus saw him and asked him if he wanted to be healed. The man had been ill for 38 years, and he told Jesus that he had no man to put him into the pool when the water was troubled, and while he was going another stepped down before him. Jesus told him to rise, take up his pallet, and walk, and the man was healed, taking up his pallet and walking. That same day was the sabbath, so the Jews told the man that it was not lawful for him to carry his pallet. He then told them that a man had told him to take up his pallet and walk, and Jesus later found the man again in the temple, telling him to sin no more so that nothing worse could befall him.

The cured man told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him, and the Jews persecuted Jesus for working on the Sabbath. Jesus answered them by saying that his Father was working still, so he was working. Because Jesus had also called God his father, the Jews sought all the more to kill him. Jesus then warned the Jews that the hour was coming when the dead would hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who heard would live, for the Father granted life in himself and in his son. Jesus also said that he could do nothing on his own authority, as he sought the will of he who sent him. Finally, he said that, if the Jews believed Moses, they would believe Jesus, for Moses wrote of him.

Chapter 6
After this, Jesus went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, the Sea of Tiberias. A multitude followed him, because they saw the signs which he did on the disabled, and he went up into the hills. He asked Philip how the disciples could buy bread for the crowd, and Philip told him that 200 denarii would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little. Andrew told Jesus that a boy there had 5 barley loaves and 2 fish, and Jesus had Andrew make the people sit down on the grass. Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were seated, also giving as much fish to the people as they wanted. After they ate their fill, he told his disciples to gather up the fragments left over so that nothing could be lost. They filled 12 baskets with the fragments of the bread, and the people were amazed that Jesus had fed all of them. Jesus then withdrew agian into the hills, perceiving that the people would force him to become king, and he went across the sea to Capernaum, walking on the water to the amazement of his disciples. On the next day, the people from Tiberias got into boats and went to Capernaum, seeking Jesus. When they found him on the other side of teh sea, they asked him when he came there. Jesus told the crowds that they sought him because the people had eaten their fill, and he told them to not labor for the food which perished, but for the food which endured to eternal life. The people asked for Jesus to give them the bread which gave life to the world, and he said, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst." The people murmured at his comment that he was the bread which came down from heaven, and they identified him as the son of Joseph, asking how he came down from heaven. Jesus told them to nor murmur among themselves, saying that he would raise the believers up on the last day. His teachings at the Capernaum synagogue caused disputes with the crowd, and Jesus told them that he who ate from the bread would live forever.

Jesus' disciples asked him who could listen to his hard saying, but he said to them, "Do you take offense at this? Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending where he was before? It is the spirit that gives life, the flesh is of no avail; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you that do not believe." Jesus knew from the first who those were that did not believe, and who it was that should betray him. After this, many of his disciples drew about and no longer went about with him, and Jesus asked the disciples if they would also go away. Peter asked him where they would go, as Jesus had the words of eternal life. Jesus answered that he chose the twelve, and that one of them was a devil, knowing that Judas Iscariot was to betray him.

Chapter 7
After this, Jesus went about in Galilee, as the Jews sought to kill him in Judea. The Jews' feast of the Tabernacles was at hand, so the disciples asked Jesus to leave Galilee and go to Judea, that his disciples may see the works he was doing. Jesus told his disciples, "My time has not yet come, but your time is always here. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify of it that its works are evil. Go to the feast yourselves; I am not going up to this feast, for my time has not yet fully come." He rmained in Galilee, and, after his brethren had gone up to the feast, he went up to the feast in private. The Jews searched for him at the feast, and some people muttered that he was either a good man or was leading people astray, but no one spoke openly of him. At the middle of the feast, Jesus went up into the temple and taught. The Jews marveled at his intelligence despite his lack of studies, and he said that his teaching was not his, but his who sent him. He said that he who spoke on his own authority sought his own glory, but he who sought the glory of him who sent him was true, and in him there was no falsehood. He then criticized the Jews for not keeping Moses' law, as they wanted to kill him. The people claimed that he had a demon and that no one sought to kill him, but Jesus told them to not judge by appearances, but with right judgment. Some of the people asked if he was the man whom they sought to kill, and they asked if the authorities really knew the Christ. Jesus proclaimed that he had come on his father's accord, and that the people did not know his father. The Pharisees heard the crowd's muttering, so they sent men to arrest Jesus. He then said that he would be with the Jews a little longer before he would go to him who sent him, and the Jews would seek him and not find him, as where he would be they could not come. The Jews then asked if he intended to go to the dispersion among the Greeks and teach them, and questioned what he meant.

On the last day of the feast, Jesus stood up and proclaimed, "If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, 'Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water.'" Some people said that he was the prophet or the Christ, but some asked if the Christ was to come from Galilee, saying that the scripture said that the Christ was descended from David and came from Bethlehem. Some people wanted to arrest Jesus, but none laid hands on him due to the division of the crowd. The officers then went back to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them why they did not bring him; the officers answered that no man ever spoke like him. The Pharisees decided to arrest Jesus, although Nicodemus asked if their law judged a man without first giving him a hearing and learning what he did.

Chapter 8
The Jews went each to their own houses, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early in the morning he came again to the temple, where he sat down and taught them. The scribes and Pharisees brought in an adulteress, telling Jesus that she had been caught in the act of adultery, and asked his opinion on stoning her. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground, and he said, "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her." Once more he bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. The people went away, one by one, beginning with the eldest, until only Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus looked up and asked the woman where they went, and he told the woman that, just as the persecutors were no longer there to condemn her, he would not condemn her, and he told her to never sin again.